Posts Tagged ‘indonesia’

Taiwan and Indonesia have agreed to strengthen cooperation in fighting human trafficking at a recent meeting in the Southeast Asian country.

Under a joint statement signed at the first meeting of top immigration officials from the two countries, Indonesian immigration personnel will escort Indonesian victims of human trafficking sent back by Taiwan on their way home, to ensure their safety.

This will be done at the discretion of the victims and escort missions will start upon arrival at airports in Indonesia, according to the statement.

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Officers with the Ngurah Rai International Airport’s special police precinct foiled on Saturday the departure of eight people, six of whom were allegedly victims of human trafficking.

The eight people, who were on their way to depart to Malaysia, consisted of six female migrant workers by the names of Katrina Kali Ghobi, Ade Erwin Kondo, Sofia Ambu Kaka, Mariana Ina Kaka, Yuliana Pogo, and Nuraini M Nor. The two others were believed to be an escort named Anita Laksono and a communicator named Aziz Suparto Mustafa. The latter two’s apparent roles were facilitating the travel of the six women and introducing them to their would-be employers on the other side of the border.

Officers, consisting of airport precinct personnel and East Nusa Tenggara Police’s criminal investigation directorate, stopped them just minutes before the flight departure time at gates number 17 and 18 of the domestic departure terminal of Ngurai Rai Airport in Tuban, Badung regency. The officers took them to the airport’s precinct office and quizzed them.

“They were caught before boarding the plane,” said Bali Police spokesperson Sr. Comr. Hariadi, citing that the group planned to depart on Lion Air flight JT 0017 to Jakarta, which would continue to Batam by flight JT 0372.

The six women, aged between 20 to 28-years-old, had been promised employment as domestic workers in Malaysia. They originate from East and West Nusa Tenggara provinces.

As many as 15 women from Bogor, West Java, have allegedly become victims of human trafficking in Palembang, South Sumatra.

The women were forced to work as commercial sex workers at the Rio Guesthouse in the former localization area of Teratai Putih. They were taken to Sukarami Police station for identification and recording before being returned to their parents.

The Jakarta Police cyber crimes unit told the Jakarta Globe that the 19-year-old madam, identified only as M, was taken into custody along with seven underage girls in a hotel room in the capital as part of a sting operation.

Officers masquerading as potential clients arranged a meeting at the South Jakarta Hotel by masquerading as potential clients on the via the Facebook page, where they were also able to peruse albums and prices for various girls.

The girls allegedly charged between 800,000 and 1.5 million rupiah ($75 to $150) for sexual services, almost half of which went to M, senior police commissioner Rikwanto told The Saturday Age.

Cyber crimes unit head Audie S. Latuheru said police believed M had operated the prostitution racket for the past two years.

She recruited girls aged between 16 and 20 after befriending them in shopping malls in the poorer areas of Greater Jakarta, luring them with the promise of a big income.

An undisclosed number of women and children from the Philippines and Indonesia continue to be trafficked into forced commercial sex in countries like China, Hong Kong, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Australia, according to the International Labor Organization (ILO).In a report, the United Nations-attached agency described as “high” cases of forced labor among domestic workers trafficked from these countries to Malaysia, Singapore and Hong Kong.“In Japan and Australia, women (from the Asia-Pacific region) have entered these countries legally under entertainment visas in the expectation of working in dance clubs, only to be forced into providing sexual services,” said the ILO, which is based in Geneva, Switzerland.

Debt bondage has been cited as one of the main contributing factors towards human trafficking activities across the borders of Indonesia and Malaysia.The coordinator of the Archdiocesan Human Development Committee (AHDC) for Cross-Border Counter Trafficking Indonesia-Malaysia Project 2010-2011, Dominic Lim, said the victims of human trafficking would often fall prey to individuals and syndicates who exploited their economic vulnerability and pretended to offer them passages to better life, although in the end were still trapped in debt bondage and a life of slavery.

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The findings are based on research that includes interviews with Indonesian crew members from a number of foreign charter fishing vessels, and the examination of crew members’ employment contracts, wage calculation sheets, pay slips, bank statements and other documents.The research shows that although crew voluntarily enter into contractual agreements to work on foreign chartered vessels contracted to New Zealand companies, they are then subject to exploitative working conditions – some forced to work shifts of more than 50 hours, and paid as little as NZ$6700 a year. There are examples of crew having their passports and other documents confiscated and the use of debt bonding to keep crew members compliant is a common tactic.Maltreatment on board, including verbal, physical and occasionally sexual abuse, and inhumane punishments, insanitary living conditions, food rationing and substandard food and water quality have already been documented by the team.

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The AFP is working with the INP to develop an agreed process for the improved collection of evidence to expedite the return of minors to Indonesia.Where age is not able to be clearly established, the person being investigated or prosecuted will continue to be given the benefit of the doubt and will be returned to Indonesia without charge.This enhanced cooperation complements measures announced by the Gillard Government in July to determine the age of people charged with people smuggling offences.

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“Everyone has a role to play in delivering information about human trafficking to the grass roots level so that people we know do not fall victims,” she said at the launch of the state-level Anti-Trafficking Awareness Campaign and the National Council of Women’s Organisations (NCWO) Sarawak Zone.According to statistics, 68 arrests were made in the state, whereby 83 victims were rescued from 2008 until October this year.The majority of the victims were Indonesians, Filipinos, Thais and even Malaysians.“Even though most of the victims were foreigners, it does not mean we do not have to be responsible for them. They are also fellow human beings, not commodities to be traded by ruthless syndicates.”